The Historians' History of the World 05

The Adriatic and the Ionian straits separated Italy from her eastern acquisitions. The great provinces of Illyricum and Macedonia comprised the whole expanse of territory from the Adriatic to the Ægean Sea, and were divided from one another by the long mountain ridges of Boion and Scardus. Ancient Greece, from Thermopylæ to Cape Malea, constituted a single command under the title of Achaia. With Asia, Rome communicated principally by sea, the route of the Hellespont being insecure, and the barbarous tribes of Thrace but imperfectly subjected. The province of Asia, recovered by Sulla, was held by an imperator with a numerous army, destined to control the dependent potentates of Bithynia, Cilicia, and Cappadocia. The eastern proconsul watched the movements of Mithridates, and unravelled his intrigues with every court from the Halys to the Tigris. He intruded himself into the affairs of Cyprus, Palestine, and Egypt, hunted down the mountaineers of Crete, and menaced with the vengeance of the republic the buccaneers who swarmed in every harbour of the eastern Mediterranean. On the southern coasts of the great inland sea the domain which once belonged to Carthage, limited on either side by the lesser Syrtis and the river Bagradas, formed the proconsular province of Africa; while the five cities of the Pentapolis acknowledged their entire dependence on the will of the republic. The extent of her empire under Sulla was hardly one-half of that which it attained under Augustus and Trajan.

The various relations in which the different classes of the provincial population stood to the ruling city, have been compared with the constitution of a Roman household. The colonies of Roman citizens planted in the provinces, enjoying the full exercise of their national rights, and presenting a miniature of the metropolis herself, held the position of the son towards the paterfamilias. The conquered races, which had thrown themselves on the victor’s mercy, were subjected to his dominion as unreservedly as the slave to that of his master. Those among them to whom the state had restored their lands and institutions, occupied a place analogous to that of freedmen. Some cities or nations had voluntarily sought a connection with Rome on terms of alliance, but with acknowledged inferiority. Others again stood on a more independent footing, offering a mutual interchange of good offices and citizenship; and lastly, there were some which entered into confederacy with the republic with perfect equality of rights on either side. All these had their prototypes respectively in the clients, the guests and the friends of the Roman noble. Within the limits of each Roman province there were generally some states which stood in these several relations to the republic; and the strictness of the military and civil administration was maintained or relaxed towards them according to their respective claims. But after all the mass of the provincial population belonged to the class of dediticii

, that is, of those who had originally submitted without conditions, the slaves, as they may be termed, of the great Roman family. These were subjected to the severest fiscal and other burdens, enhanced by the rapacity of their rulers, who, from the consul or prætor to the lowest of their officers, preyed upon them without remorse and without satiety.